Problem Statement
There is a lack of data of the experience of the participants of the Salus Running Group.
Aim
To increase the quality of life (anxiety, self-esteem) of clients who participate in the Salus Running Group by 15 percent by December 31, 2017.
EQIP Support to the Project
- QI coach: Linda Saunders
- Data Coach: Nicole Adkin
Project Overview
Running is hard. But Ottawa Salus Support Housing and Mental Health Services, that fact doesn’t deter the Recreation Therapy staff who offer a Running Group as a positive recovery focussed program for a small number of clients. Although there is anecdotal information and examples of the importance and impact of the running program on participant’s recovery, there has never been a formal way to capture data on the client experience.
The EQIP initiative is about to change that. The Ottawa Salus group used many of the EQIP tools to better understand the situation, and identify the root cause analysis.
Although their focus is to get more participants in the running group, and for participants to maintain running as a key component of their recovery longer term, they knew they had to start one step behind that – to collect data about the running experience.
The lightbulb moment for this team came early on, when they were at an EQIP training session. It was then that we realized we needed to get feedback directly from the participants to inform their improvement focus.
They used Experience-Based Co-Design methods, starting with an emotions statement for each step in the process. “Seeing the enthusiasm from the team when they heard the feedback from participants, was really inspiring and encouraging for the RTs who oversee the running group,” explains Joanne Cormack, Project Lead.
To see and hear the progress from the beginning of the process to the end, gave insight to those running the group.
After identifying the root causes of why running is hard, the team was able to identify some change ideas including – taking training slowly, having previous runners talk to new group members, providing education sessions on key techniques important for running, offering flexibility in running schedules, among others.
As their next step, the results will be presented back to the participants, and together they will focus their improvement work on the ones that will help them work towards their next goal: how to increase participation in the group, and increase the number of people who sustain running long term.